


One Hundred Ways

by kaibasetos



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Genre: Drabble Collection, Fondness & Bickering: The Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-28
Updated: 2016-08-02
Packaged: 2018-07-27 06:42:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 3,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7607785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaibasetos/pseuds/kaibasetos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three words, eight letters, and one hundred different ways to communicate the sentiment.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Let Me Drive

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, everyone! I'm so sorry that it's taken me so long to post some new content for you. As some of you may know, work has essentially been consuming my life, soul, and free time for the past five months. However, I am now on a new schedule that allows me more flexibility, and I'm using that to try to make a return to the home I know and love so much. Which is JouKai fanfiction, obviously.
> 
> So... What better way to do that than with a new drabble collection? This one actually has a unifying theme, unlike _Love, They Say_ , so I felt like it warranted its own fresh start. In this collection, I'll be using phrases from a Tumblr post titled "One Hundred Ways to Say 'I Love You'" as prompts for each chapter. I may not be using the phrases verbatim, but they will most certainly be strong influences. I'll definitely link to the post to give proper credit at some point, but for now I'm keeping the link up my sleeve so as to keep the theme of each chapter a surprise. Each chapter will likely be a fairly short drabble like the ones I'm posting tonight, as it's easier for me to write short scenes than full-fledged fics right now, but some may end up lengthier than others. Either way, I hope you all like what I've completed so far and what is yet to come!
> 
> Anyway, enough talking. On to the fic!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The prompt for this chapter was the line _"Pull over. Let me drive for a while."_ Enjoy!

Jounouchi walks with a spring in his step when they exit the building, a broad smile on his face. The cool air of downtown New York City tosses his hair into a tangled mess and his eyes rest on the broad lines of Kaiba’s shoulders under his blazer, the calculated way he moves as he slips his ticket to the valet at the counter. The lights of the skyscrapers and billboards bathe them both in flashes of blue and green and pink. Everything is loud.

“Thanks for invitin’ me,” Jounouchi says beneath the shout of the city, ambling up next to Kaiba and nudging him with an elbow. “Your business trips really aren’t as boring as you made ‘em out to be.”

Kaiba glances his way, and Jounouchi doesn’t miss the quiet exhaustion in his eyes, an implication it seems he’s been trying his best to hide for the past several hours. Jounouchi’s excitement dulls at the sight, as though his emotions subconsciously shift to bring him down to Kaiba’s level. Kaiba’s voice sounds uncharacteristically heavy. “That is remarkably simple for you to say.”

“You alright?” Jounouchi prompts him immediately, his brow furrowed in concern.

Kaiba averts his eyes, silent. He doesn’t want to speak of his weakness, the way such events drain him and leave him feeling lifeless and listless, longing for loneliness. They are a burden he must bear to be successful, and bear them with pride and strength he will, but the way the mindless chatter and tinny false laughter crawls under his skin is like something foreign and unwelcomed.

Jounouchi leans against him, just enough that Kaiba can feel his weight, and allows him the quiet.

The valet pulls Kaiba’s car around to them, sleek and black, and when he hands the keys to Kaiba he is rewarded with a tip that is relatively far too large for his service. The look on his face when he stammers out his thanks is priceless, and Jounouchi can’t help but feel his chest bloom with warmth. Kaiba isn’t a complete asshole, but his moments of generosity are easy to overlook unless you’re paying attention.

Jounouchi always is.

He stops Kaiba’s step forward with a tug on the elbow of his blazer. “Let me drive.”

Kaiba fixes him with a look reminiscent of seeing someone destroy a priceless antique right in front of his eyes. “Let  _ you  _ drive?  _ My  _ car?”

Jounouchi gives him the most positively angelic facial expression he can manage, one that says he’s never been convicted of a single miniscule wrongdoing in his entire life. “I won’t break the speed limit. Not once. Promise.” When Kaiba doesn’t seem convinced, he rolls his eyes, presses closer and speaks with more sincerity. “You’re too fuckin’ tired to drive, Kaiba. Give me the keys.”

Kaiba stares at him for a long moment, as though sizing up the weight and sentiment of his offer.

“Fine,” he agrees at last, sounding every bit like a singular word requires an incredible amount of force. He presses the keys into Jounouchi’s hand, but twists his voice into something lower at the same time, something more intense and conspiratorial. “If you mess this up, I will not let you forget it.”

“Oh,” Jounouchi laughs, giving him a wink and sticking his tongue out. “That better be a promise.”


	2. It Reminded Me Of You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The prompt for this chapter was the line _"It reminded me of you."_ Enjoy!

“Did you see the moon last night?” Jounouchi asks conversationally, tipping his head over the edge of the couch to look at Kaiba in the opposite chair. His body language is the complete opposite of Kaiba’s, splayed open and comical where Kaiba is so still and proper, borderline tense.

“No.” Kaiba’s response is as smooth and levelled as his typing.

“Man, you really shoulda seen it.”

“It's there every night, Jounouchi,” Kaiba points out dryly. “It isn’t as though viewing it is a particularly privileged opportunity.”

“Shut up, you dick, I know that.” Jounouchi scrunches up his face in a rude expression Kaiba doesn’t even see. “But it was awesome last night. It reminded me of you.”

That’s enough to tear Kaiba’s gaze away from his laptop at least momentarily, which Jounouchi considers a victory, however sloppy he looks at the moment hanging off of Kaiba’s overly ornate furniture.

“How so?” Kaiba asks, and his tone is one of caution. He looks like he’s either expecting a ridiculous joke or a profound explanation and he isn’t sure which one to be more wary of.

Jounouchi flips himself over belly-down to look at Kaiba properly. His hair falls into his eyes and his head spins for a second, so he rights himself by grabbing the arm of the couch. It’s indelicate, to be sure, but preferable to the alternative.

“It looked, I dunno,” Jounouch pauses as he searches for the right words, looking idly around the room for a moment before settling on Kaiba again. “Mysterious and intimidating and so far away, but beautiful.”

Kaiba blinks impassively at him, and if he’s not imagining things he thinks he sees Kaiba’s fingers curl, his nails biting into his palms like he’s trying to quell a response he absolutely should not have. Just as quickly as the motion occurs, however, Kaiba is back to typing, his eyes on the screen again, if a bit glazed. He looks as if he’s still trying to process Jounouchi’s words.

“I would say that statement is true of the moon every night,” he comments, though his voice is a bit more reserved.

“Yeah,” Jounouchi grins at him, a meaningful, fond gesture Kaiba misses. “It is, isn’t it?”


	3. It's My Treat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The prompt for this chapter was the line _"No, no, it's my treat."_ Enjoy!

“Stop,” Kaiba commands as Jounouchi attempts to nonchalantly slide the checkbook off to his side of the table.

Jounouchi huffs. “I dunno if you know this, Kaiba,” he says with a tone that clearly and strongly suggests that Kaiba knows this, “but I’m capable of payin’ for my own meals.”

Kaiba reaches over and grabs the edge of the checkbook, regarding Jounouchi shrewdly. “It would be safe to say that I’m aware, considering one of your favorite pastimes is reminding me of this fact every single time we are presented with this situation.”

“Then let me do it,” Jounouchi grumbles, trying to tug the black binding out of Kaiba’s grasp and failing miserably.

“No,” Kaiba says simply, and he raises an eyebrow as though daring Jounouchi to challenge him.

Around them, the restaurant is alive with expensive red wine and warm, sentimental light, soft laughter that echoes up to the wide, high arches that seem to decorate every entryway of the building. Between them, there is nothing but their gaze locked, their hands locked, their pride locked, neither of them willing to give an inch. Jounouchi looks like he’s ready to start a fight. Kaiba looks like he’s sizing up his prey rather than his partner.

“Are you truly obligated to be this stubborn?” Kaiba murmurs, and he tilts his head to the side just a bit. “It’s my treat.”

Jounouchi gives him a quizzical look, and Kaiba uses the split second he’s caught off-guard to slide the checkbook out of his clutches and safely into his control. He doesn’t even need to look down to slip a credit card out of the inner pocket of his blazer and into the checkbook, and maybe he allows himself to appear a little smug about it.

“Why do you always do that?” Jounouchi asks, but it sounds more begrudgingly accepting than accusatory. He already knows why. Kaiba enjoys feeling useful, like he’s capable of caring for someone, and though it’s aggravating to accept what he perceives as charity Jounouchi is content to allow him that. So long as he puts up a fight first, anyway.

“Why do you feel the need to question my motivations at every turn?” Kaiba returns slyly.

“Because your motivations are actually always fuckin’ _questionable_ , Kaiba.” Jounouchi stretches, then shrugs. “But whatever you wanna do, rich boy.”

“Really?” Kaiba asks, deadpan. “Does this sincerely warrant returning to insults used when we were teenagers?”

“Fight me,” Jounouchi replies teasingly.

Kaiba scoffs in the back of his throat as though the very concept is unthinkable, but lets the matter go.

Jounouchi enjoys feeling like he’s won, at least a little bit. Kaiba is content to allow him that.

So long as he puts up a fight first, anyway.


	4. Let Me Fix It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The prompt for this chapter was the line _"Come here. Let me fix it."_ Enjoy!

By Kaiba’s calculations, it has taken Jounouchi approximately twelve minutes and thirty-two seconds too long to get ready. He allows himself a moment to skim his own reflection in his bedroom mirror, smoothing out a stray wrinkle in his button-up and frowning at it. He checks the silver watch on his wrist again. Twelve minutes and thirty-six seconds.

“Are you finished?” Kaiba asks for the third time, distinctly less patient now.

“I can’t, fuckin’,” Jounouchi grumbles from the restroom adjacent, where golden light spills from the open door. “Listen, do you know when the last time I wore a tie was? I can’t fuckin’ do this. I hate this. How do you do this every damn day?”

Kaiba pinches the bridge of his nose between his fingers, willing away his encroaching headache. “This isn’t a funeral, Jounouchi. We are going to meet  _ your  _ friends. What could possibly be so important that it’s taking you so long?”

Jounouchi makes a disgruntled sound and emerges from the doorway looking a sight. The light frames him with a halo, a stunning silhouette, and the way his eyes burn with frustration makes Kaiba instinctively clench his jaw. The entrancing image is only marred by the tie he’s wearing over his white shirt, the knot of which is sloppy at best.

“This,” Jounouchi growls, tossing his arms out to signify that he’s given up on every portion of his life. “This is what’s takin’ so long. I can’t get it to not look like this.”

Kaiba looks at him with something approaching both mocking and fondness, and he exhales. “Come here. Let me fix it.”

Jounouchi narrows his eyes for a moment, then crosses the room to Kaiba with his hands fumbling to undo his tie, leaving it hanging limp. “For the love of fuckin’ God, please.”

“Strictly speaking, such profanity isn’t necessary,” Kaiba reminds him as he takes the ends of Jounouchi’s tie in his hands. He works with a precision and artistry only built from years of performing the same act time and time again, and although he’s never been burdened with the task of performing it for someone else, he suspects it must be the same.

“Okay, I’m pretty sure you  _ never _ think it’s necessary,” Jounouchi jibes, seeming to ease back into his old antics as Kaiba takes control. He grins to himself. “I think you like it sometimes, though.”

“You have no evidence to support that claim,” Kaiba responds calmly, sliding the end of Jounouchi’s tie through the loop he’s created and knotting it perhaps a bit too tightly.

“That’s what you think,” Jounouchi remarks with a flirtatious note, and it isn’t until Kaiba straightens up fully that he takes notice of their proximity. The way Jounouchi is smirking at him, the way Jounouchi looks like this, the collar of his shirt pressed against the skin of his neck. For a moment Kaiba thinks of his hands there instead. His mouth.

He clears his throat.

“We’re late.”

“We could be even later,” Jounouchi suggests, and the moment he sees Kaiba’s gaze shift to something more primal he smiles. “But you wouldn’t wanna have to undo all your hard work, would you?”

“If we are not out of my front door in the next five minutes,” Kaiba says, every syllable clearly, painfully enunciated, weaponized not like a threat but equally as fierce.

“Don’t burst a blood vessel there, Kaiba,” Jounouchi interrupts him airily, running a hand through his hair and sidestepping Kaiba to head towards the door of the bedroom. He calls back over his shoulder, “I’m done anyways. _Now_ who’s the one holding us up?”

Kaiba presses his eyes closed.

This boy is going to be the death of him one of these days.


	5. Drink This

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The prompt for this chapter was the line _"Here, drink this. You'll feel better."_ Enjoy!

“I’m dying,” Jounouchi insists from the bundle of pillows and blankets on his couch. “This has gotta be what dying feels like.”

He ends the statement with a coughing fit followed by a pitiful sound, sinking further into his cocoon. Kaiba continues his careful process in the adjacent kitchen, pouring tea into one of the only suitable cups he managed to find in the cabinets of Jounouchi’s apartment. It’s plastic rather than glass, but he supposes that doesn’t have to matter too much. “I’m fairly certain that the symptoms you are experiencing are not symptoms indicative of imminent death,” he says as he meticulously spoons out honey from its jar.

“Has anyone ever told you your bedside manner fuckin’ sucks, Kaiba?” Jounouchi asks, his voice hoarse. “‘Cause if not, I think you should know. Y’know, maybe it’s somethin’ you can work on. Self-improvement and all that.”

“If you were truly dying at the present moment, would you be capable of arguing with me?” Kaiba asks, stirring the tea he’s prepared before turning to drop the spoon into the sink. He picks up the cup and carries it with him as he reenters the living room, and Jounouchi gives him the best sarcastic grin he can manage.

“Of course I would. You don’t think my dying breath would be spent being an asshole to you? C’mon, do you even know me?”

Kaiba rolls his eyes, perching on the edge of the couch. “Clearly I may have underestimated your dedication.” He holds the cup out to Jounouchi. “Drink this. You’ll feel better.”

Jounouchi stares at the drink warily, stifling another cough and squinting. “What is it?”

“Peppermint tea with honey,” Kaiba responds levelly. “It’s useful for relieving the pain of a sore throat and it may ease your cough.”

Jounouchi’s eyes brighten and a genuine smile crosses his face this time. Kaiba shifts uncomfortably, his skin prickling with the intensity of the attention. He feels abruptly self-conscious, out of place and foolish. Perhaps he hadn’t calculated just how prepared he was to receive this sort of reaction.

“You made this for me,” Jounouchi says, almost like he’s questioning it. His voice is rough but brimming with awe and sentimentality. “All this time I was wondering what the fuck you were doing in there and you were bein’ a good fucking person right under my nose.”

Kaiba clears his throat and averts his eyes.

“Aw, c’mon, it’s not like I’m gonna tell anyone,” Jounouchi teases him, taking the cup out of his hands. “Your secret’s safe with me.”

“I was more fond of you when you were fighting with me,” Kaiba murmurs, mainly because that dynamic is easier for him to cope with than Jounouchi acting like he’s the savior of the universe because he made a single gesture of kindness. “You can return to your typical litany of insults.”

“Wow, what a romantic,” Jounouchi remarks gruffly, taking a sip of the tea and cringing. “Okay, this is actually kinda gross. Do I really have to drink this?”

Kaiba snorts in amusement and shakes his head. “That’s more like it.”


	6. Can I Hold Your Hand?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The prompt for this chapter was the line _"Can I hold your hand?"_ Enjoy!

There’s something entrancing about riding passenger with Kaiba, especially in the evening like this. There’s something about soft purr of the engine, the glow of the city enveloping them, the street lamps flickering in and out of a windowed view, all of it underlined by the ambient sounds Kaiba likes to play via Bluetooth. Tonight, they’re listening to the ocean.

Jounouchi finishes typing out his reply to Yuugi about how excellent movie night was and how they should definitely do it again next weekend, and as soon as he hits send he locks his phone and drops it into his lap. The action plunges the interior of the car into relative darkness, and his eyes wander to Kaiba.

Kaiba always looks focused when he’s driving, but right now is different. Though he’d had a lot of smart remarks to contribute about joining them to watch  _ yet another _ action movie, Jounouchi gets the sense his protest was all for show. He hasn’t spoken the entire ride home, but it’s a comfortable, content sort of silence. For once in his life, it seems he isn’t really thinking about anything in particular.

It hits Jounouchi that what he’s reading in Kaiba is relaxation; there’s no tension in his shoulders, no far-away, distraught look in his eyes, no tight grip on the steering wheel. There’s just him, the night, and the quiet lullaby of the sea on stereo. He looks calm, serene.

It’s beautiful.

Jounouchi is overwhelmed with the urge to be close to him.

“Hey, Kaiba,” he says, keeping his voice low so as not to shatter the delicate atmosphere. “Can I hold your hand?”

Kaiba glances easily over at him, then back to the road. For a few moments Jounouchi wonders if Kaiba is going to fall back on his traditional response of pretending as though he hasn’t heard him. He’s particularly fond of doing that when Jounouchi is making an attempt at being affectionate, as though avoiding it will mean not being obligated to react to it.

Then, slowly, wordlessly, Kaiba takes one hand off the wheel and reaches across to lay it on the center console. Jounouchi’s heart leaps in his chest.

He presses his palm against Kaiba’s, and just as Kaiba laces their fingers together, a wave crests on the shore.


	7. One More Chapter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The prompt for this chapter was, funnily enough, the line _"One more chapter."_ Enjoy!
> 
> Shoutout to the anime for introducing Kaiba to us by showing him reading _Thus Spoke Zarathustra_. I don't recall if this detail is present in the manga, but it's a very fitting work for him, and Nietzsche really just suits him well overall.

“Calm is my soul, and clear, like the mountains in the morning. But they think me cold, and a mocker with terrible jests,” Kaiba reads, his voice measured as he scans the text on the page. “And now do they look at me and laugh: and while they laugh they hate me too. There is ice in their laughter.”

He pauses there, sparing a look over at Jounouchi, whose head is resting on his shoulder. Jounouchi’s eyes flutter open and he regards Kaiba with a gentleness he doesn’t feel like he deserves, something that crawls through his bones and spreads through his veins like lightning.

“Are you done already?” Jounouchi asks sleepily. “I was enjoyin’ that.”

“You’re dozing off,” Kaiba points out. “I do not believe Nietzsche’s work makes for a suitable bedtime story, as they say.”

Jounouchi wrinkles his nose. “I mean, it’s a little fucked up. I like listenin’ to you read, though. It’s soothing.”

Kaiba stares at him, uncomprehending. “Soothing?”

“Yeah, like you get real into it and your voice is--” Jounouchi cuts himself off, covering his mouth with a hand as he yawns. “It’s nice to listen to.”

“I wasn’t aware,” Kaiba states, flicking to the next page of the book just so he has something to do with his hands. He’s all _too_ aware of all the places they’re touching, the way Jounouchi is nestled up against him, an arm around his waist. The way Jounouchi has his fingers curled in his shirt. He wonders if Jounouchi can hear, perhaps even feel, the rhythm of his heart racing.

“Maybe that’s ‘cause you’ve never had the right audience,” Jounouchi mumbles sleepily. “Keep going. Please?”

His grip on Kaiba’s shirt tightens when he says it, and he presses closer. Kaiba inhales sharply.

“Fine,” he acquiesces on an exhale, trying to control his tone. “One more chapter.”

Jounouchi grins and settles again, but when Kaiba picks up on the next page his eyes slip closed and his breathing slows. He’s dozing by the tenth line, asleep by the twentieth. He’s so warm.

Kaiba keeps reading for him, just in case.


End file.
